7th Oceania Women’s Kendo Seminar and Taikai was held over 14-15 June 2025 at the Gold Coast Recreational Precinct and include 1.5 day seminar, afternoon friendly taikai (competition), and evening networking activities. The event was held as a sport camp format where attendees stayed onsite and ate together and got to know each other throughout the event.
The seminar was lead by 4 high level female instructors with support from our top 2 most senior female instructors in Australia including our own Hiroko Tsukadaira Sensei (Renshi 7 dan). Seminar content included bokuto (wooden sword practice leading into practice with Shinai (bamboo sword) and practice in bogu (armour), technical discussion on defence/offence and female specific topics and training/fighting strategies and considerations, technical workshop on shinpan (referee) skills followed by practice.
Evening session after dinner included presentation about Sport Integrity specific to women by the National Integrity Manager. This followed with a networking session and the senior instructors sharing their personal Kendo journey stories and experiances.
The Sunday afternoon competition was organised as a socil/friendly competition with teams made up of randomly made up teams, so participants got to form teams with people they may not know well. It was well received and everyone had great fun. The women also practiced refereeing and competition management roles like scoring, announcing etc.
We also ensured that the event management reasonability was entrusted to some Qld women who developed their leadership skills from this experiance, supported by younger Qld women.
Feedback post event has been extremely positive (94% satisfaction) with general feedback suggesting future events should be held at the same location and with the same format.
This event is made possible through funding secured through the Queensland Government’s Active Women and Girls Sports Grants Program
The Queensland Government’s new Active Women and Girls program aims to increase female participation across all areas of sports and recreation – from coaching and volunteering, to umpiring and team management, to inspire the next generation of female athletes and secure the sporting future of women and girls across Queensland.
